VOLUME 16, NUMBER 6
MONTH OF THE CAMAS
JUNE 23, 1987 J
Major celebration planned in recognition of the Hell Gate Treaty
Plans are underway for a day-long celebration a few weeks from now in recognition of the Salish and Kootenai Tribes' Hell Gate Treaty.
Concluded with the U.S. government in 1855, the treaty will be 132 years old on July 16, the day set aside for the 1987 celebration.
Plans call for two caravans — a south-bound one from the Flathead,
and a north-bound one trom the Bitter Root Valley - to meet at "the oval" at the University of Montana in Missoula for a program of speakers and a feast.
The July 16 gathering is expected to be the first of similar efforts by other tribes leading to the U.S. Constitution's 200th birthday in 1989, in an effort to remind or inform people about the special Indian-federal relationship.
The purpose of the CSKT celebration is to focus people's attention on the fact that the treaty is a living document - a valid, very-much-in-use agreement between two sovereign nations which share a unique association. Although it's been violated since
1855, many of its principles are still in effect.
"We're still here as a Tribal people. The principles are still there. We're asking that they be honored," explained Greg DuMontier at a gathering June 13 in Pablo (see the story elsewhere in this issue). DuMontier works for the Tribes as an executive assistant.
"Tribal members are encouraged to attend the celebration in support of the protection of treaty and Tribal rights," he said.
More complete details, such as times and other activities planned for the day, will be announced here in the weeks to come.
Non-Indian irrigators meet with D.C. visitors
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Folklore has it that when people's ears buzz, it means someone's talking about them. If that's so, then the Reservation's Bureau of Indian Affairs' employees probably couldn't hear their Rice Krispies two Saturdays ago for all the internal audio racket.
The BIA was the target of a two-hour complaint session June 13 in Ronan.
Estimates are that between 500 and 600 (one report claimed 900) people turned up at the Ronan High School gym to listen to Senator John Melcher say what most of them wanted to hear: The BIA doesn't belong in the irrigation-project business, and now is the time for a new law that would give
the water users, and the non-Indian Joint Board of Control, control of the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project.
Appearing with Melcher at the 10:30 am. meeting were JBC chairman Alan Mikkelson and two men from the Bureau of Reclamation in Washington, D.C, who promised to take good notes for dissemination back East.
The meeting could be characterized as a question-and-answer session between the senator and Mikkelson, and a forum for each, along with a handful of audience members, to state their belief that the water users should be in charge of the day-to-day management of FIIP.
(Continues on page five)